selves worse by being in the world without making it better, may retire. I never read of a hermit, but in imagination I kiss his feet; never of a monastery, but I could fall on my knees and kiss the pavement. But I think putting young people there who know nothing of life, nothing of retirement, is dangerous and wicked. It is a saying as old as Hesiod

Εργα νεῶν, βουλαι τε μέσων, ευχαι τε γερόντων.* That is a very noble line: not that young men should not pray, or old men not give counsel, but that every season of life has its proper duties. I have thought of retiring, and have talked of it to a friend; but I find my vocation is rather to active life." I said, some young monks might be allowed to show that it is not age alone that can retire to pious solitude; but he thought this would only show that they could not resist temptation.

He wanted to mount the steeples, but it could not be done. There are no good inscriptions here. Bad Roman characters he naturally

mistook for half Gothic, half Roman. One of the steeples, which he was told was in danger, he wished not to be taken down; "for," said he, "it may fall on some of the posterity of John Knox; and no great matter!" Dinner was mentioned.-JOHNSON: "Ay, ay; amidst all these sorrowful scenes, I have no objection to dinner."

We went and looked at the castle, where Cardinal Beaton was

*Let youth in deeds, in counsel man engage;

Prayer is the proper duty of old age.-Boswell.

+ The cathedral when entire had five towers and a great steeple; three of the towers remain, and are about a hundred feet in height. By grants from the Government, the ruins of St. Andrews, with those of a similar description throughout Scotland, are kept from further decay by occasional repairs.-ED.

murdered,* and then visited Principal Murison at his college, where is a good library-room; but the Principal was abundantly vain of it, for he seriously said to Dr. Johnson, “You have not such a one in England."

The professors entertained us with a very good dinner. Present: Murison, Shaw, Cook, Hill, Haddo, Watson, Flint, Brown. I observed, that I wondered to see him eat so well, after viewing so many sorrowful scenes of ruined religious magnificence. "Why," said he, "I am not sorry, after seeing these gentlemen; for they are not sorry." Murison said, all sorrow was bad, as it was murmuring against the dispensations of Providence.-JOHNSON: "Sir, sorrow is inherent in humanity. As you cannot judge two and two to be either five or three, but certainly four, so, when comparing a worse present state with a better which is past, you cannot but feel sorrow. It is not cured by reason, but by the incursion of present objects, which wear out the past. You need not murmur, though you are sorry."--MuRISON: But St. Paul says, I have learnt, in whatever state I am, therewith to be content."-JOHNSON: "Sir, that relates to riches and poverty; for we see St. Paul, when he had a thorn in the flesh, prayed earnestly to have it removed; and then he could not be content."Murison, thus refuted, tried to be smart ; and drank to Dr. Johnson, Long may you lecture!" Dr. Johnson afterwards, speaking of his not drinking wine, said, "The Doctor spoke of lecturing (looking to him). I give all these lectures on water."

He defended requiring subscription in those admitted to univer sities, thus: "As all who come into the country must obey the king, so all who come into an university must be of the Church."

* The castle of St. Andrews is connected with many interesting historical associations. It was the residence of the chivalrous James I. of Scotland and the prison of Gawin Douglas and George Buchanan. In front of its walls George Wishart, the Protestant martyr, suffered on the 1st of March, 1545. "The executioner having kindled the fire, the powder that was fastened to his body blew up. The captain of the castle, who stood near him, perceiving that he was yet alive, bade him be of good courage and commend his soul to God. 'This flame,' said he, hath scorched my body, yet hath it not daunted my spirit; but he who from yonder high place beholdeth us with such pride shall within a few days lie in the same spot as ignominiously as now he is seen proudly to rest himself."" The allusion here was to Cardinal David Beaton, who from one of the towers of the castle, seated on a cushion, surveyed the spectacle of Wishart's death. About fifteen months afterwards, May 29th, 1546, Beaton was murdered in the castle by Norman Leslie, son of the Earl of Rothes, Kirkaldy of Grange, and others, who, besides revenging the death of Wishart, had a private feud with the cardinal.-ED.

Of these St. Andrews Professors, Dr. George Hill, the youngest, became the most distinguished. He succeeded Dr. Robertson as leader of the moderate party in the Church, and was author of "Theological Institutes," and other works. He died December 19th, 1819. Principal Murison, who boasted so egregiously of the College Library, and, what is more remarkable, seems to have astonished and silenced Johnson by the boast, died July 30, 1779.-ED.

And here I must do Dr. Johnson the justice to contradict a very absurd and ill-natured story as to what passed at St. Andrews It has been circulated, that, after grace was said in English, in the usual manner, he with the greatest marks of contempt, as if he had held it to be no grace in an university, would not sit down till he had said grace aloud in Latin This would have been an insult indeed to the gentlemen who were entertaining us. But the truth was precisely thus. In the course of conversation at dinner, Dr. Johnson, in very good humour, said, "I should have expected to have heard a Latin grace, among so many learned men: we had always a Latin grace at Oxford. I believe I can repeat it." Which he did, as giving the learned men in one place a specimen of what was done by the learned men in another place.

We went and saw the church in which is Archbishop Sharp's monument.* I was struck with the same kind of feelings with which

the churches of Italy impressed me. I was much pleased to see Dr Johnson actually in St. Andrews, of which we had talked so long. Professor Haddo was with us this afternoon, along with Dr. Watson We looked at St. Salvator's College. The rooms for students seemed very commodious, and Dr. Johnson said the chapel was the neatest place of worship he had seen. The key of the library could not

The monument was commissioned from Holland by the Archbishop's son, Sir William Sharp of Scotscraig. It is a very elaborate work, composed of black and white marble with an urn containing a long inscription, and under it a bas-relief representation of the murder of Archbishop Sharp on Magus Muir, May 3rd, 1679. The assassination of the prelate, as is well known, was the work of a band of fanatics, nine in number, the principal parties being a landed proprietor, Hackston of Rathillet, and his brotherin-law, Balfour of Kinloch or Burley, of whom Scott has given so vivid a portraiture in "Old Mortality." The archbishop's tomb was completely repaired and renovated in 1849, and on this occasion it was found that the vault had been opened and the bones of the archbishop carried away!-ED.

be found; for it seems Professor Hill, who was out of town, had taken it with him. Dr. Johnson told a joke he had heard of a monastery abroad, where the key of the library could never be found.

It was somewhat dispiriting to see this ancient archiepiscopal city now sadly deserted We saw in one of its streets a remarkable proof of liberal toleration; a nonjuring clergyman strutting about in his canonicals, with a jolly countenance and a round belly, like a wellfed monk.

We observed two occupations united in the same person, who had hung out two sign-posts. Upon one was, James Hood, White Iron Smith" (i. e., Tin-plate Worker). Upon another, “The Art of Fencing taught, by James Hood." Upon this last were painted some trees, and two men fencing, one of whom had hit the other in the eye, to show his great dexterity; so that the art was well taught.— JOHNSON: "Were I studying here, I should go and take a lesson. I remember Hope, in his book on this art, says the Scotch are very good fencers."

We returned to the inn, where we had been entertained at dinner, and drank tea in company with some of the Professors, of whose civilities I beg leave to add my humble and very grateful acknowledgment to the honourable testimony of Dr. Johnson in his "Journey."

We talked of composition, which was a favourite topic of Dr. Wat son's, who first distinguished himself by lectures on rhetoric.-JOHNSON: "I advised Chambers, and would advise every young man beginning to compose, to do it as fast as he can, to get a habit of having his mind to start promptly; it is so much more difficult to improve in speed than in accuracy."-WATSON: "I own I am for much attention to accuracy in composing, lest one should get bad habits of doing it in a slovenly manner."-JOHNSON: “Why, sir, you are confounding doing inaccurately with the necessity of doing inaccurately. A man knows when his composition is inaccurate, and when he thinks fit he'll correct it. But, if a man is accustomed to compose slowly, and with difficulty, upon all occasions, there is danger that he may not compose at all, as we do not like to do that which is not done easily; and, at any rate, more time is consumed in a small matter than ought to be."-WATSON: "Dr. Hugh Blair has taken a week to compose a sermon."-JOHNSON: "Then, sir, that is for want of the habit of composing quickly, which I am insisting one should acquire "*-WATSON : Blair was not composing all the

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* Paley's direction in his College lectures was, "As to preaching, if requires a sermon every Sunday, make one and steal five."-ED.

your situation

week, but only such hours as he found himself disposed for composition." -JOHNSON: "Nay, sir, unless you tell me the time he took, you tell me nothing. If I say I took a week to walk a mile, and have had the gout five days, and been ill otherwise another day, I have taken but one day. I myself have composed about forty sermons. I have begun a sermon after dinner, and sent it off by the post that night. I wrote forty-eight of the printed octavo pages of the Life of Savage' at a sitting; but then I sat up all night. I have also written six sheets in a day of translation from the French." -BOSWELL: "We have all observed how one man dresses himself slowly and another fast."-JOHNSON: "Yes, sir; it is wonderful how much time some people will consume in dressing; taking up a thing and looking at it, and laying it down, and taking it up again. Everyone should get the habit of doing it quickly. I would say to a young divine, Here is your text; let me see how soon you can make a sermon.' Then I'd say, 'Let me see how much better you can make it.' Thus I should see both his powers and his judgment."

We all went to Dr. Watson's to supper. Miss Sharp, great-grandchild of Archbishop Sharp, was there; as was Mr. Craig, the ingenious architect of the new town of Edinburgh, and nephew of Thom son, to whom Dr. Johnson has since done so much justice, in his 'Lives of the Poets."

We talked of memory and its various modes.-JOHNSON: "Memory will play strange tricks. One sometimes loses a single word. I once lost fugaces in the Ode 'Posthume, Posthume.'" I mentioned to him that a worthy gentleman of my acquaintance actually forgot his own name.-JOHNSON: "Sir, that was a morbid oblivion."

FRIDAY, AUGUST 20.

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Dr. Shaw, the Professor of Divinity, breakfasted with us. I took out my "Ogden on Prayer,” and read some of it to the company. Dr Johnson praised him. Abernethy," said he, "allows only of a physical effect of prayer upon the mind, which may be produced many ways, as well as by prayer; for instance, by meditation. Ogden goes further. In truth, we have the consent of all nations for the efficacy of prayer, whether offered up by individuals or by assemblies; and revelation has told us it will be effectual." I said, "Leechman seemed to incline to Abernethy's doctrine." Dr. Watson observed that Leechman meant to show that, even admitting no effect to be produced by prayer respecting the Deity, it was useful to our own minds. He had only given a part of his system Dr. Johnson thought he should have given the whole.*

• Dr. William Leechman wrote a Life of Hutcheson, the father of speculative philo